Opinion: Non-union members should not be forced to pay union dues

by Boris Epshteyn, Chief Political Analyst

(Sinclair Broadcast Group)

EDITOR'S NOTE: Boris Epshteyn formerly served as a Senior Advisor to the Trump Campaign and served in the White House as Special Assistant to The President and Assistant Communications Director for Surrogate Operations.

WASHINGTON (Sinclair Broadcast Group) - A current Supreme Court case centers on the following question: can workers in the public sector, like teachers and police officers, be forced to pay fees to unions even if they are not a member of a union?

Unions are very politically active on issues ranging from taxes to trade.

The petitioner in this case claims that forcing employees to pay an organization that has a political position violates those employees’ free speech rights under the First Amendment of our Constitution.

This also seems like a fairness issue. Imagine if a group of your colleagues all decided to take a trip. Would it make any sense for you to be forced to pay for their travel if you chose not to go? I don’t think so.

If the court rules against the unions, which is expected, that would hurt them a lot. For example, Wisconsin took away mandatory union membership and fees in 2011. By 2015 membership in public sector unions went from 50 percent to barely over 25 percent.

Overall, only about 10 percent of Americans are now part of a union. That number was 20.1 percent in 1983.

Democrats have been mobilizing support behind the unions since public sector unions give almost 10 times more money to Democrats than to Republicans.

Here is the bottom line: if unions are being propped up by money from those who do not want to join them, something is wrong with the unions themselves. We are a free country. Employees should be free to choose which organizations to pay their hard-earned money to.